The Tebow Commercial: Why the Heated Protest?

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Why are groups such as the National Organization for Women (NOW), the Feminist Majority Foundation, the Women's Media Center, and numerous "pro-choice" groups apoplectic over a Super Bowl commercial sponsored by Focus on the Family?

Clearly, the commercial's subject matter has propelled it to the front ranks of controversy in the days leading to the Super Bowl. Entitled "Celebrate Family, Celebrate Life," the ad purportedly (though none of the ad's critics have actually seen it) tells the story of Florida All-American and Heisman trophy winner Tim Tebow and his mother, Pam.

In 1987, Tim's future parents, Bob and Pam Tebow, were in the Philippines on a mission trip. During the trip, Pam fell into a coma from amoebic dysentery and was administered several strong medications to treat her potentially life threatening illness. Later, doctors, worried about consequent severe damage to the baby she was carrying, strongly urged Pam to abort her fifth child. She declined their medical advice and gave birth to a perfectly healthy baby boy, Tim Tebow, on Aug. 14, 1987. Pam cited her strong pro-life Christian beliefs for her decision to have her baby over the doctor's objections.

Why should such a story so threaten the "pro-choice" forces in America that they do not want the vast audiences watching the Super Bowl to see it? Why not just pay for a commercial of their own advocating the "pro-choice" position? Isn't the free-speech answer to speech you don't like, more free speech, advocating a different view?

Instead, the "pro-choice" forces are pressuring CBS to reverse itself and pull the ad. Why? I believe it's because this ad featuring Tim and his mother puts a dramatic human face on unborn children. It confronts people across the nation with the fact that every "problem pregnancy" involves not just a pregnant mother, but also a real, live unborn human being.

Just last week, David Daleiden and Jon A. Shields wrote an article entitled Mugged by Ultrasound which appeared in the Weekly Standard. Daleiden and Shields report on the fact that increasing numbers of abortion workers are converting to the pro-life cause as they come face to face with the compelling humanity of unborn children.

They relay the testimony of Paul Jarrett who ceased doing abortions after performing 23 of them, explaining that "when I found the head of the baby I looked squarely in the face of another human being-a human being that I just killed." Daleiden and Shields also tell the story of Luhra Tivis, a former NOW activist and the late Dr. George Tiller's secretary, who when confronted with the undeniable humanity of the victims of Dr. Tiller's late-term abortions, resigned her secretarial post and became an Operation Rescue volunteer.

The "pro-choice" movement knows they are losing and that ultrasound machines and commercials like the Tebows' are confronting the country with the undeniable humanity of each unborn child, just as Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin put a human face on the 3 million slaves in America, thus hastening their liberation

If the "pro-choice" forces think they have an effective counter argument to justify the continued wholesale killing of unborn Americans, then they should pay their money and make their case. I suspect they know they don't have such arguments and so they descend to the tactic of seeking to silence the arguments of their opponents.

I believe they know they are losing the battle for the hearts and minds of Americans, especially those 37 and under, the post-Row babies. I was privileged to take part in the protest against the largest abortion clinic in the Western hemisphere in Houston, Texas, Jan. 18. There were approximately 14,000 people in the protest. The crowd was about 40 percent Anglo, 30 percent Hispanic, 30 percent African-American, and 80 percent under 30 years of age. They carried signs which proclaimed, "We survived Roe-Roe won't survive us!" I believe they are right. They will insist that the wholesale killing stops, and the first step is to introduce the human face of the babies doctors advise aborting. Meet Tim Tebow!